Soul Sacrifice: Salvation to the Sacrifice
by xxxYin-Yangxxx
Summary: He was a solitary being, and as such, it was supposed to be an easy deed; but as he raised his arm to absorb her essence, he found himself giving her his instead. What could he do? They were each other's sacrifice, when did they become each's salvation?
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I do not own Soul Sacrifice and any of its characters.**

* * *

I calmly walked over towards my fallen partner. Each step felt heavier than the last. I never wanted this. I should have just kept to myself. I shouldn't have gotten personal. I shouldn't have…

As I stood over her, she just stared at me with eyes pleading for relief. Reluctantly, I raised my arm and started surging power. I could feel her essence flowing into myself.

It felt sickening.

What was I doing?

Before I even noticed, I started giving her energy. She looked at me, confused by my actions. She wasn't alone in that. In one final burst, I finished transferring half of my energy, leaving me exhausted.

"Why?" She asked, her eyes painted with pain and confusion. "Why did you save me? Does this not make it harder?" There were tears in her eyes. And once more I am reminded why I could not do it.

Sortiara was precious to me.

"Why?!" She sent a wave of ice towards me, as she did earlier. But unlike earlier, I didn't move a muscle, partly because I was tired from the earlier bout and partly because of the energy transfer, but mostly because I couldn't bring myself to… "Dodge damn you!" She sent another blast of ice towards me.

I was flung to a pillar, but I couldn't bring myself to care despite the pain. I just looked back up at her and saw that she had summoned her Giant's Arm and started hitting me repeatedly. I just took all of it because that was all that I could do.

"Damn you!" She cursed at me with every hit, even as the Giant's Arm dispelled. Eventually, her hits started getting weak and her tears developed soft sobs. "Why?" She whimpered as she clutched my raiment and hid her face against my chest, desperate for an answer. "Why are you making it so hard?"

Weakly, I raised my hand and put a hand on her back. She raised her head to look at me, confusion evident in her eyes. And just as I had done when I saw her cry, I softly caressed her back.

And just like that, the metaphorical dam broke and she started wailing as she held on to me for dear life.

As I continued my ministrations, my resolve only strengthened: I would never be able to kill her. She became dear to me, and, if the way she was acting was any indication, I to her.

But the truth, always so cruel, was right outside the Abbey. Avalon, and their judgment was waiting for an outcome. And with that kind of revelation, what are we to do?

* * *

 **Soul Sacrifice is a great game with a great story. The only gripe I've had with it was when Sortiara died after bonding with her. And to make matters worse, they saw it fit to show me her thoughts after I already killed her. I get it! I'm a monster! You don't have to make me go on a damned feel'd trip to the Feelippines!**

 **xxxYin-Yangxxx out.**


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: I do not own Soul Sacrifice in any shape or form.**

* * *

My body ached.

It had been since my earlier fight with Sortiara, who was at this time pacing nervously in front of me as she had been for the better part of the day. We were only given until night to finish the task, and judging from the dimming light from across the room, the time was almost up.

Despite the grim situation we were in, I couldn't help but smile at the frantic expression on her face. It was so out of place on her normally angry face.

"You know… You look better when you're angry." I managed to say those long-forgotten words. She immediately stopped in her tracks and gave me the same face that she had given me when I first said it long ago. But as soon as she looked at me, her angry expression once again turned into uncertainty.

It was amazing actually. For a person normally so aloof with only one constant angry expression etched on her face to actually have it show way more than just plain rage. Yet, her eyes were even more so expressive than her face. I could actually see what was going through her mind. Chief among those was loneliness.

I could see it plain as day. There were tears waiting to be shed as she desperately tried to find a way to keep me alive. For all the anger that she held, she still had the capacity to care.

"This is no laughing matter." She said with a clipped tone, although there was an unmistakable shake in her voice.

I looked at her resignedly and gave a smile.

"You can always just sac-"

Before I managed to finish my sentence, she cut me off harshly, "Don't you dare finish that sentence or I'll kill you."

"That's the idea." I laughed at my own joke.

"You are not helping at the very least!" Her voice rose a bit and along with it, the desperation that she was feeling.

"…" There was a long pause as I considered her for a moment. "You know I'll still be with you if you absorb me."

"It is not the same!" She yelled at me. Her eyes started to soften and well up with pent up tears. "It's not the same… Damn it all…" She crouched to the ground while hiding her face.

Feeling bad for once again making her cry, I held out my arms to her invitingly, hoping she'd get the message. To my relief, she uncharacteristically timidly crawled into my arms and hid her face against my chest like earlier.

"Why is it that everything I care about finds their way out of my reach…" She asked, sounding so lost. I couldn't answer her for I had none to give. Instead, I just ran my fingers through her hair, an action that seemed so foreign to me yet it felt so natural. She just continued to sob as we waited for the sun to disappear.

Only Romalus knew how long we had each other.

Her breathing slowed down, signaling her descent into sleep. I looked at her pained, sleeping face and I held back a sob, not for me, but for her. With the way things are, there was only one way that someone was leaving this church: It was either alone or no one at all.

Such a cruel fate.

" _What you both desire shall be granted."_

My spine shivered at the incorporeal voice as I recognized it. I have heard it once before when… my father had died.

I slowly looked up, fully expecting an extravagant chalice floating overhead, but instead what was in front of me was a rather unassuming grail that seemed to be made out of clay. This was not how I remembered the Sacred Chalice to look like.

" _Your mettles shall be tested and your lives bound to each other's fate."_

This wasn't the chalice. At least, this wasn't the one they spoke of in legend. When the Chalice had appeared to me, its words were like honey, sweet and tempting. It promised to give me what I wanted in exchange for what seemed to be at the time, a simple sacrifice.

This thing's offer was too… realistic. It had no promises of easy reward, but instead it gave us a challenge? The way it said it was also unappealing. It sounded like it read something from a report. It was really peculiar.

Unlike with the Sacred Chalice, I wasn't compelled to say yes, but instead I felt really skeptic.

I looked at the sleeping Sortiara, then at the grail and then at the dimming light from across the room. I was hard-pressed for an answer and I didn't know what to do. I looked at Sortiara once more, and upon looking at it, I made my decision.

"I accept for us both." I resigned my fate to the grail in front of us, apologizing profusely to Sortiara in my mind. _'I'm sorry.'_

" _Very well."_ And just like that, the grail was gone. I closed my eyes to prepare for some kind of inhumane change like I had seen so many times to countless people and sorcerers who gave in to their greed.

When moments passed and I felt nothing happened, I opened my eyes and was met with Sortiara's unmarred face.

"What… happened?" I looked around, trying to find even the subtlest change around me, but the only thing that changed ever since closing my eyes was the continual dimming of sunlight. What did the grail do exactly?

The small twisted hope that welled up inside me disappeared as minutes passed and nothing happened.

Soon, the light faded and with it, our time together.


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer: Soul Sacrifice and its characters do not belong to me in any shape or form.**

* * *

I opened my eyes. I had fallen asleep and it was already night. I looked down to see that Sortiara was still asleep on my chest. This was weird to say the least. Avalon should have already been here and done… something.

Ignoring the ringing in my ears, I slowly lifted Sortiara's head from my chest and gently placed it to the ground. I took off my robes and draped it over her body hoping that it would hide her later, even if it's just a little, should Avalon sorcerers come and look for us.

Just as the ringing died down in my ears, the door slammed open and I dropped down into a fighting stance as I looked at the newcomer.

It was an Avalon sorcerer looking worse for wear.

Our eyes met and he immediately ran towards me looking so frantic. I would have attacked him weren't it not for how desperate and nervous he looked. Perhaps there _was_ a way Sortiara and I could get away. As long as the sorcerer can't see Sortiara, and hopefully, in the man's nervousness, he would accept things in face value.

When the man was near me he grabbed my hand and started pulling me outside.

"What's gotten into you?" I asked as I let myself be pulled, rather roughly I might add.

"Sanctorium sorcerers arrived, a whole battalion of them." The man spat out spitefully.

That gave me pause.

What would Sanctorium sorcerers be doing here? Somewhere so near Avalon territory?

Sanctorium was a rival organization of Avalon who saves those corrupted by the chalice as opposed to killing them. I respected their decisions of saving instead of killing, but I've held too much hate when I started out to be able to forgive those monster-turned people.

So I went to Avalon, a group who approved of sacrificing those monsters. Initially, I wasn't told that I was going to be given a partner nor was I told that I would have to kill my partner. But it wasn't such a big issue then, but now…

Things had changed so radically than when I had started.

I couldn't bring myself to kill any of those creatures anymore. And I couldn't bring myself to kill my partner… Right now, all I wanted was to join Sanctorium. At least there we wouldn't have to live in fear. But if keeping Sortiara alive meant I have to go with Avalon, so mote it be.

Still, it was awfully convenient for Sanctorium sorcerers to appear when they did. Had they arrived any later then Sortiara and I would have probably been found out by Avalon.

I resisted the urge to look at her direction lest the sorcerer with me finds something amiss. I just hope that she doesn't become _too_ mad when she wakes up… Who was I kidding? She would go berserk.

Should Sanctorium be the one to find her, I just hope that they would have a great deal of patience to deal with her worst moods. Luckily, I left my robes with her. If she manages to connect the dots, then it would be easier for all of them.

When the sorcerer finally pulled me out of the church, I lay witness to one of the roughest battlefield I ever had the misfortune to see. Almost immediately, there were craters, broken shards, dead bodies scattered all around them. Despite all that, however, there were still flashes of explosions and sounds of fighting in the distance.

Judging from the amount of bodies around them, I could probably guess that they had been in combat for a relatively long time. For them to keep going for such a long time was nothing short of terrifying.

There was some slight shuffling from beside me and I could see the sorcerer summon a bomb from his arm and threw it to the sky where he immediately summoned four pinwheels and sent them hurtling to the airborne bomb.

There was a loud blast of electricity when the two projectiles met. And at once, some sorcerers from the distance summoned golems in tandem and were dashing away from the battlefield. Oddly, the other sorcerers didn't give chase.

Once again I felt an urgent pull from the sorcerer beside me and almost suddenly afterwards, felt subsequent distortions of reality. When everything felt normal again and I was able to regain my vision, I looked around.

From where I was, I could see the church we were just in, only this time, from far away.

"I've managed to secure our new sorcerer." The sorcerer that was with me earlier reported. I turned to look at the person he was talking to.

The man was intimidating. His countenance was amiable and his smile gentle, but there was a certain glint in his eyes that was unnerving to me. It was just one feature that looked intimidating, but I thought that it was more than enough to know that this man was nothing as he seemed.

"Good work. He should prove advantageous to us in the long run." The man said with a friendly grin. I guess it served to be placating, but it only ended up being menacing in my eyes.

"He _should_ be worth our while Certes." Another voice from beside the intimidating man, now identified as Certes, came up, looking none too impressed with me if the man's scowl was any indication. "I don't want to find out that I've lost a handful of my men to someone so green."

I riled up at what he said and narrowed my eyes, but I didn't do anything other than that. I just needed to stay with them until I find a chance. That's all.

"Now now, Alcander. Give the man a chance, isn't that right Mister Librom?" I found myself unusually vexed by Certes' pacifying gesture and found myself gritting my teeth.

"Call me Geoffrey." I said in the most sickeningly sweet voice I possibly can and held out my hand towards Certes. Even if Alcander was the one who insulted me the most that night, I couldn't help but be more antagonistic towards this man playing innocence.

"There see? We're starting to become friends now too." Certes gave me a rather wily grin before taking my offered hand and shook it.

Alcander seemed oblivious to all the fake pleasantries and snorted before turning away. Taking that as a cue to leave, I let go of Certes' hand and started to walk but not before seeing the scheming look in his eyes.

I turned away my head to dispel any discomfort I felt, but even as I did, I felt a gaze settled upon me. I turned my head to meet the stare of a bizarre-looking man that I knew I had not met before, but yet… His presence was oddly familiar.

What in Romalus' name have I gotten myself into?

* * *

Back in the once battlefield, three people were walking towards the direction of the church. They were walking with a strange mix of purpose and uncertainty. They had left their group behind to let them recuperate their wounds as they had no such injuries in their persons.

Earlier, they had been wandering around the place, looking for people that they still had a chance to save regardless of whether they were an enemy or not.

It all went into shambles fairly quickly.

They had all set out their separate ways earlier that day to find monsters that they could save and possibly bring into their sanctuary. There were degrees of successes in the saving aspect of the day, but not so much on their recruitment.

Their plan once they had met up with each other on their rendezvous point was to head home and leave behind their objectives for another day. There was something that stopped them.

Near the disappearance of daylight, there was a voice whispering to them and urging them to stray from them current path and go towards the church.

Having not experienced such an occurrence, they were naturally curious and wary. As it turned out, it probably would have been better had they not followed their curiosity.

"I'm saddened by the lack of beauty in today's venture." A rather effeminate man sighed as he regarded the battlefield with a sorrowful gaze. The man's crossed arms clenched in what seemed to be anger as his face contorted in rage. "How could they be so barbaric and ungraceful?"

"I'm afraid that we will never know Calixto." A woman with caramel skin replied with a wry and humorless smile, having grown used to the man's rather eccentric speech pattern.

There was a moment of silence between the three but the woman knew that their other companion was staring at her questioningly. "Milady Lenixion, why have we even ventured to this area?" A masked man asked with a somewhat accusing tone that made her slightly wince.

"To be perfectly honest with you, Aegrus, I do not know." Lenixion lowered her head, a bit of shame seeping in. "It was a sudden… calling, you might call it. I couldn't bring myself to ignore it. Yet… I still do not see why I was brought here."

Aegrus just nodded and kept silent as he followed the caramel skinned woman to the church. Idly reminiscing of the horrible memories of when he was forced to sacrifice his partner to get into an organization that he would soon betray.

The trio went in the church and frowned simultaneously as they entered the once holy ground.

There were signs of a great struggle all around the place.

Aegrus couldn't help but notice that the damage was considerably lacking than previous initiates he had seen from before.

"Search the place." Lenixion ordered, holding some faint hope that someone had survived. All three of them knew what this place was or rather what it symbolized. After all, all three of them had to have started sacrifice someone some time.

With a nod, Calixto and Aegrus dispersed and started to quickly scour the place for any traces of life. Never mind the fact that they might find an enemy, just as long as they're able to preserve a life, then they would be able to hold true to their creed.

It took them a considerably short time until someone uttered something.

"Milady, over here." Calixto and Lenixion immediately rushed to Aegrus' position and found a woman with a red robe draped over her. Just from that, they had already gotten a faint hope that she was still alive.

"Have you checked if she was still alive?" Lenixion's brows furrowed in worry.

"She still breathes and lives." Aegrus assuaged her worries.

"Good, let's bring her to the Asylum."

Aegrus nodded, not bothering to question her decision of bringing a potential Avalon sorcerer. He hoisted the sleeping woman up and carried her bridal style as he followed Lenixion out of the church.

Perhaps she was the reason why they were called to that place.


End file.
